Saturday, January 31, 2015

Ballsy move. Obama would have threatened to send a sternly worded letter.

Jordan has threatened to fast-track the execution of a
would-be suicide bomber the Islamic State is trying to free if the
terror group kills its captured pilot, it was reported today.
The government has apparently warned that Sajida al-Rishawi and other
jailed ISIS commanders would be ‘quickly judged and sentenced’ in
revenge for Muath al-Kaseasbeh’s death.
It comes after a deadline for a possible prisoner swap allegedly set
by ISIS passed yesterday with no clue over the fate of al-Kaseasbeh or
fellow Japanese hostage Kenji Goto.
Intelligence sources said ISIS’s refusal to prove that al-Kaseasbeh was alive meant any deal with the militants was doomed.
Now Jordan has reportedly stepped up its rhetoric by warning of its intent to retaliate if the negotiations end in bloodshed.

We are now below the French. How embarrassing. Thanks President Obama.

Dubai (AFP)
– The ideological leader of Yemen-based Al-Qaeda in the Arabian
Peninsula (AQAP) said Friday that France had surpassed the United States
as the top enemy of Islam.
With the “weakening” of the United States in recent years, France has
replaced America in the “war on Islam,” Ibrahim al-Rubaish said in an
audio message published by AQAP’s media arm on YouTube.
US intelligence agencies consider AQAP to be the most dangerous branch of the jihadist network.
One of the group’s ideologues, Nasser bin Ali al-Ansi, has claimed in
a video that AQAP was behind the January 7 attack on French satirical
weekly Charlie Hebdo that left 12 people dead.
Cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed published by the magazine have angered many Muslims.
Western governments say it remains unclear if AQAP directly
orchestrated the attack on the weekly, although they do believe one or
both of the attackers, brothers Said and Cherif Kouachi, spent time with
jihadists in Yemen.

A political advocacy group is calling out the leadership of a West Virginia union for attacking a new right-to-work proposal.
Since the midterm election, the Republican majority within the state
government has been proposing ideas to help improve the struggling
economy. Among these ideas is a right-to-work bill which was introduced
Tuesday. However, leadership within the local AFL-CIO quickly condemned
the idea with some fairly harsh words.

If the bill passes, West Virginia will become the 25th state to outlaw forced unionization as a condition of employment.

“They’re f—ing liars,” West Virginia AFL-CIO president Kenny Perdue told the Charleston Daily Mail.
“Workplace freedom is a line of BS,” he continued. “It has nothing to
do with workplace freedom. It’s employer freedom to do at will what
they want to do to employees — that’s all it is.”Keep on reading…

The NYPD will launch a unit of 350 cops to handle both counterterrorism and protests — riding vehicles equipped with machine guns and riot gear — under a re-engineering plan to be rolled out over the coming months.
The Strategic Response Group, or SRG, will be devoted to “advanced disorder control and counterterrorism protection,” responding to the sort of demonstrations that erupted after the Eric Garner grand jury decision and also events like the recent Paris terror attacks.
“It will be equipped and trained in ways that our normal patrol officers are not,” Commissioner Bill Bratton said Thursday.
“It will be equipped with all the extra heavy protective gear, with the long rifles and the machine guns that are unfortunately sometimes necessary in these ­instances.”

Friday, January 30, 2015

Hillary Clinton took more than 200 privately chartered
flights at taxpayer expense during her eight years in the U.S. Senate,
sometimes using the jets of corporations and major campaign donors as
she racked up $225,756 in flight costs.
Clinton, 67, the frontrunner for the Democratic presidential
nomination in 2016, reported the travel in official filings with the
Senate. The records were provided to Bloomberg News by a Republican
operative.
Some of the companies whose planes she used included Coca-Cola Co., Citigroup Inc. and Saban Capital Group Inc.
While the flights fell within congressional rules and were not out of
the ordinary for senators at the time, they could play into the
emerging Republican line of attack that Clinton’s wealth and years in
government office have left her out of touch with the voters she’ll
court on the campaign trail.

Thursday, January 29, 2015

The chairman of the National Committee of the Communist
Party USA has penned a 2,023-word manifesto making the critical point
that American Communists are eager to work with the Democratic Party to
advance the modern communist agenda and achieve communist goals.
Communist Party chairman John Bachtell published his essay last week
at People’s World, a “daily news website of, for and by the 99% and the
direct descendant of the Daily Worker.”
“[L]abor and other key social forces are not about to leave the
Democratic Party anytime soon,” Bachtell promised. “They still see
Democrats as the most realistic electoral vehicle” to fight against
perceived class enemies.
Bachtell, 58, is playing the long political game and he has a strategy, he said.
“First, we are part of building the broadest anti-ultra right
alliance possible, uniting the widest array of class (including a
section of monopoly), social and democratic forces. This necessarily
means working with the Democratic Party,” the communist leader
explained.

Washington (CNN)The U.S. military and intelligence community now suspect that one of the five Taliban detainees released from Guantanamo Bay in return for Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl
in May of last year has attempted to return to militant activity from
his current location in Qatar, CNN has learned exclusively.

The
development has led to an ongoing debate inside the administration
about whether there is a new threat from this man, and potentially the
other four.

This is the first known
suggestion that any of the detainees involved in the exchange may be
trying to engage again in militant activity. It comes at a politically
sensitive time as the administration has quickened the pace of prisoner
release in an effort to encourage the closure of the Guantanamo, and the
Army must decide in the coming weeks whether and how to punish Bergdahl
for leaving his post.

Obama and Democrats undoubtedly think this is a good thing. He would be happy we are helping so many children. The truth is this is a huge fail of the Great Society programs and the welfare entitlement state. We need to be helping people become self-sufficient, not more dependent.

WASHINGTON (Reuters)
– The number of children in the United States relying on food stamps
for a meal spiked to 16 million last year, according federal data,
signaling a lopsided economic recovery in which lower income families
are still lagging behind.
The roughly one in five children who received food stamps in 2014
surpassed pre-recession levels, when one in eight or 9 million children
were on food stamps, according to the U.S. Census survey of American
families released on Wednesday
Republicans in Congress have sought to cut back on the Supplemental
Nutritional Assistance Program or food stamp program as part of a larger
plan to balance the budget.
Early last year lawmakers proposed $40 billion in cuts from the
program over 10 years. The final farm bill signed into law trimmed $8.6
billion from the program, eliminating benefits for about 850,000 people,
according to estimates by anti-hunger advocates.

Mitt Romney has attracted an unlikely supporter in his possible 2016 White House bid: Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.).
Asked
if Romney has any shot at defeating Hillary Clinton in 2016, Pelosi
told The Hill, “No, no. I mean, he might be a nice person — no offense,
no offense — [but] let’s save you time.”
A smiling Pelosi added, “Let me put it this way — I hope he’s their nominee.”

The Environmental Protection Agency inflated the
monetized benefits of a major air quality rule to justify imposing a
harsher smog standard on U.S. counties, according to a new report by
Energy In Depth (EID).
“EPA’s ozone rule could very well be the costliest regulation in U.S.
history,” said Steve Everley, spokesman for the petroleum
industry-backed EID. “If a rule of this magnitude is to be imposed, then
the EPA should consider providing a far more scientifically robust
‘public health’ basis — one that doesn’t rely on inflated health
benefits or a lack of appreciation for the very real economic costs.”
The EPA proposed its costly smog, or ozone, standard the day before
Thanksgiving 2014. The agency mandated that ambient smog levels be
lowered from 75 parts per billion (pbb) to levels between 70 ppb and 65
ppb. The EPA also solicited comments for an even lower standard at 60
pbb — one which could put almost the entire country out of compliance
with the rule and cost $3.4 trillion by 2040.Keep on reading…

The too-damn-high rent is now the least of Jimmy McMillan’s problems.
The flamboyant gubernatorial candidate has been slapped with an
eviction notice ordering him out of his $872-a-month rent stabilized
East Village apartment.
McMillan, founder of the fringe political party called The Rent Is Too
Damn High, has filed suit in Brooklyn Federal Court seeking to stave off
the eviction, which is scheduled to be carried out by a city marshal
Feb. 5. Acting as his own lawyer, he is also demanding $1.3 million in
monetary damages.
The 68-year-old Vietnam War veteran has been embroiled in a legal
battle with the landlord, who claimed the one-bedroom flat on St. Marks
Place wasn’t McMillan’s primary residence, and that he actually lives in
Brooklyn.

Tuesday, January 27, 2015

First lady Michelle Obama’s face was reportedly blurred by Saudi state television Tuesday as she and the president met with new Saudi King Salman in Riyadh.
The new Saudi king shook hands with President Obama at the Erga Palace but did not acknowledge the first lady at all during a brief aside at the funeral for King Abdullah, Bloomberg View reported.Mrs. Obama
did not wear a head scarf during the funeral, as is custom for any
woman appearing in public in Saudi Arabia. Visitors to the kingdom are
not required to abide by its strict dress code, but the first lady was
still criticized on social media by Saudis using the hashtags
#Michelle_Obama_Immodest and #Michelle_Obama_NotVeiled, Politico reported.

Only two weeks after Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg released a strongly worded #JeSuisCharlie statement
on the importance of free speech, Facebook has agreed to censor images
of the prophet Muhammad in Turkey — including the very type of image
that precipitated the Charlie Hebdo attack.
It’s an illustration, perhaps, of how extremely complicated and
nuanced issues of online speech really are. It’s also conclusive proof
of what many tech critics said of Zuckerberg’s free-speech declaration
at the time: Sweeping promises are all well and good, but Facebook’s
record doesn’t entirely back it up.
Just this December, Facebook agreed to censor the page of Russia’s
leading Putin critic, Alexei Navalny, at the request of Russian Internet
regulators.

Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl, who was released by the Taliban
last year in exchange for five prisoners, is being charged with
desertion, retired Lt. Col. Tony Schaffer told Bill O’Reilly on “The
O’Reilly Factor” Monday.

Mr. Shaffer, who now works for the London Center for Policy Research, said two separate military sources have confirmed to him that Sgt. Bergdahl’s attorney has been given a “charge sheet,” listing out the articles of the uniform military code that have been violated.

Monday, January 26, 2015

It
will cost the federal government – taxpayers, that is – $50,000 for
every person who gets health insurance under the Obamacare law, the
Congressional Budget Office revealed on Monday.

The number comes from figures buried in a 15-page section of the nonpartisan organization's new ten-year budget outlook.

The
best-case scenario described by the CBO would result in 'between 24
million and 27 million' fewer Americans being uninsured in 2025,
compared to the year before the Affordable Care Act took effect.

Pulling that off will cost Uncle Sam about $1.35 trillion – or $50,000 per head.

The
numbers are daunting: It will take $1.993 trillion, a number that looks
like $1,993,000,000,000, to provide insurance subsidies to poor and
middle-class Americans, and to pay for a massive expansion of Medicaid
and CHIP (Children's Health Insurance Program) costs.

Offsetting that massive outlay will be $643 billion in new taxes, penalties and fees related to the Obamacare law.

WASHINGTON, Jan. 26, 2015
– The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff has established a research
and essay competition in honor of Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah Bin
Abdul-Aziz hosted by the National Defense University.
The king, who died Jan. 23 at age 90, oversaw the modernization of
his country’s military during the time he spent as commander of the
Saudi Arabian National Guard, a position he held from 1963 until he
became king in 2005.
Army Gen. Martin E. Dempsey said the essay competition is a fitting
tribute to the life and leadership of the Saudi Arabian monarch.

BILL NYE:
“And everybody, I just want to introduce the idea that this storm is
connected to climate change. I want to introduce that idea. I know there
will be certain viewers who will become unglued, they’re throwing
things at their television set and so on. But is the economic effect of
storms like this is huge. You cancel half of the flights out of the
world’s — one of the world’s busiest airports, certainly the eastern
seaboard is a very busy area economically for airplane travel and so
when you start having big storms and you don’t have the infrastructure
to deal with it, you are costing your society a lot of money and we’re
in the developed world where we can handle this stuff. So I just want to
introduce the idea that the strong winds that we had in southern
California, the very strong winds that will be associated with this
storm in the next couple of days, these could be connected to climate
change. Now proving any one storm is connected, specially cold-weather
events is difficult. But I just want to present that.”

Clint Eastwood’s American Sniper remained a phenomenon in
its second weekend, earning a stunning $64.4 million from 3,705
theaters and quickly becoming the No. 2 war film of all time at the
North American box office, not accounting for inflation. Its domestic
total through Sunday is $200.1 million for Warner Bros. and Village
Roadshow.
In only 10 days in release, American Sniper has eclipsed the $198.5
million earned all in by Michael Bay’s Pearl Harbor, and it will soon
overtake the $216.5 million grossed by Steven Spielberg’s Saving Private
Ryan in 1998. Taking inflation into account, Private Ryan would have
earned more than $300 million by today’s terms; Sniper is sure to
eclipse that number when all is said and done.
Overseas, the decidedly pro-American film earned another $17.6
million from 26 markets, bringing its foreign total to $47.5 million and
global haul to $247.6 million. Sniper is a tough sell overseas, but is
pulling in solid numbers in Europe and Australia (and it’s a blockbuster
in Italy, where Eastwood is an icon).Keep on reading…

HAVANA - The start
of talks on repairing 50 years of broken relations appears to have left
President Raul Castro's government focused on winning additional
concessions without giving in to U.S. demands for greater freedoms,
despite the seeming benefits that warmer ties could have for the
country's struggling economy.

Following the highest-level open talks in three decades between the
two nations, Cuban officials remained firm in rejecting significant
reforms pushed by the United States as part of President Barack Obama's
surprise move to re-establish ties and rebuild economic relations with
the Communist-led country.

"One can't think that in order to
improve and normalize relations with the U.S., Cuba has to give up the
principles it believes in," Cuba's top diplomat for U.S. affairs,
Josefina Vidal, told The Associated Press after the end of the talks.
"Changes in Cuba aren't negotiable."

It's not clear if Cuba's tough
stance is part of normal negotiation tactics or a hardened position that
could prevent the talks from moving forward.

Sunday, January 25, 2015

The Islamic State (IS) militants have executed seven women in Mosul for refusing temporary marriage, or ‘nikah’.
Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) official from Mosul Saed Mamuzini
told BasNews that IS are demanding women accept nikah with insurgents.
Nikah is a temporary marriage which permits the participants to have
sex.
“Many women refuse to have sex with IS militants, in which cases they
are arrested. The militants often kill them,” said Mamuzini.
“Today [Saturday] seven women from Mosul were killed at the IS base of Ghazlan,” he added.
Mamuzini claimed that these women had refused to enter in nikah with IS insurgents.
IS tell women that if they have sex with IS insurgents within the contract of nikah, it will be considered jihad for women.

Multiple sources within Bakersfield, North Carolina, & on Capitol
Hill tell Gotnews.com that Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) and
Renee Ellmers (R-NC) have been carrying on a long-running affair
since 2011.
The affair is something of an open secret in
Washington, D.C. Reporters at other publications, lobbyists,
congressional staffers of both parties all know about it. One staffer
for a congressman describes it as the “biggest open secret” in D.C. A
lobbyist describes Ellmers as a “social climber who has ingratiated
herself” with McCarthy.
House leadership also knows about the
affair. Speaker John Boehner reportedly told McCarthy to stop the affair
once McCarthy was elected Majority Leader says a well placed
congressional staffer. At least one leadership staffer doesn’t think the
affair ended. “They are unusually close,” says the staffer who insists
that the affair is going on.

When Jeff Greene, Al Gore, Barack Obama and others quit flying on private jets and living in mansions, I will reconsider if they really believe climate change is a crisis. Via The Daily Mail:

Billionaire
property investor Jeff Greene recently spoke at the World Economic
Forum in Davos, Switzerland, saying he believes people in the United
States need to stop aiming so high and start living with less.

'America's
lifestyle expectations are far too high and need to be adjusted so we
have less things and a smaller, better existence,' Greene, who ran for
the Democratic Senate nomination in Florida in 2010, said in an
interview.

'We need to reinvent our whole system of life.'

The
only issue Americans took with the 60-year-old's opinions was, well,
everything, given he owns a $195 million palace in Beverly Hills, which
has 23 bathrooms and a rotating dance floor, as well as four other blue
ribbon properties, and is famous for throwing wild parties on a 145-foot
yacht, Yahoo! Homes reported.

Saturday, January 24, 2015

(CNN)U.S. President Barack Obama will travel to Saudi Arabia on Tuesday in order to meet the newly appointed monarch, King Salman, and pay his respects to the family of the late King Abdullah, the White House said Saturday.

Vice President Joe Biden was originally set to have led a delegation to Saudi Arabia on Obama's behalf.

However,
the schedule for the President's departure from India has been adjusted
to allow Obama to stop in Riyadh himself on his way home, White House
press secretary Josh Earnest said.

In spite of several hundred bills passed by the GOP led house dying in Harry Reid's inbox, the mainstream media paints Republicans as obstructionists and the 'party of no.' The lack of journalistic integrity is astounding.

…Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell took the time to
point out that in three short weeks there have been more votes done this
year than in all of 2014 when Senator Harry Reid and the Democrats had
control.
The lucky bill to receive the fifteenth vote? The Keystone XL Pipeline bill.

Friday, January 23, 2015

They claimed it was OK because they would never sell your information. Instead, they gave it away to their cronies for free.

WASHINGTON (AP)
— The Obama administration is reversing itself after an outcry over
consumer privacy on HealthCare.gov, the government’s health insurance
website.
The Associated Press confirms that the administration made changes to
the website to scale back release of consumers’ personal information to
private companies that analyze Internet performance and sell ads.
The AP reported earlier this week that HealthCare.gov was sending out
personal data such as age, income, ZIP code, tobacco use and whether a
woman is pregnant.
That prompted lawmakers to demand an explanation. Privacy advocates called for immediate changes.
Administration officials at first defended the practice, saying the
outside companies only used the data to analyze the workings of
HealthCare.gov and make improvements for consumers.

Admiral Robert Papp, the U.S. special envoy to the
Arctic, revealed at a conference in Norway this week he talked to Disney
about using the characters from Frozen to teach kids about the Arctic
climate and issues related to climate change.
Papp recalled seeing hundreds of children watching Frozen and how he
was given the suggestion of how the government “might employ Disney to
come up with some public service announcements… to tell the story of the
Arctic” to kids.
And so Papp spoke with an executive at Disney about this very idea.
The Disney exec had a very “perplexed” reaction and apparently told Papp
they’re in the business of “optimism and happy endings.”Keep on reading…

A Virginia lawmaker who was just re-elected despite being
jailed for a sex scandal with a teenager has been indicted on new
felony charges, according to a special prosecutor.
The forgery and perjury indictment of Del. Joseph D. Morrissey was
returned and sealed the day before the election, and announced today by
Spotsylvania County Commonwealth’s Attorney William Neely.
The lawmaker now stands accused of forging a document he vouched for
in court, and persuading the girl’s mother to swear to its authenticity
as well. That woman, Deidre Warren, also was indicted on perjury and
forgery charges. Morrissey faces up to 10 years on each count if
convicted, Neely said.

Like President Barack Obama, Secretary of State John
Kerry won’t meet with Israeli Prime Minster Benjamin Netanyahu when he
comes to Washington, D.C., in March to address Congress at House Speaker
John Boehner’s invitation.
According to Reuters, the State Department said that Kerry wouldn’t
meet with Netanyahu because of the March 17 Israeli elections. Netanyahu
will address Congress on Iran on March 3. The department also confirmed
to TPM that Kerry and the prime minister would not meet.

New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio (D) said on Thursday
that New York’s powerful and longtime Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver
(D) was “a man of integrity” despite having just been arrested and
charged with corruption.
Silver surrendered to federal authorities earlier in the day after
being charged with allegedly taking millions of dollars in bribes.
However, de Blasio stood by the speaker during a news conference at City
Hall.
“Although the charges announced today are certainly very serious, I
want to note that I’ve always known Shelly Silver to be a man of
integrity, and he certainly has due process rights,” de Blasio said.
“And I think it’s important that we let the judicial process play out
here.”
De Blasio noted that “allegations are allegations” and said he didn’t believe Silver should step down at this point.

Free speech may soon be a luxury on the University of
Kentucky’s campus after the school’s student government surveyed the
university community on how much they’d like to restrict the First
Amendment through free speech zones.
In an emailed survey to students, UK’s student government asked
students to choose their preferred free speech policy for the
university’s public campus.
Students could choose between a “single designated free speech zone
in a specific location on campus,” or “multiple designated free speech
zones in various locations across campus.” Students could also choose
“no preference.”Keep on reading…

Federal authorities are expected to arrest Sheldon
Silver, the powerful speaker of the New York State Assembly, on
corruption charges on Thursday, people with knowledge of the matter
said, in a case that is likely to throw Albany into disarray.
The investigation that led to the expected charges against Mr.
Silver, a Democrat from the Lower East Side of Manhattan who has served
as speaker for more than two decades, began after Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo
in March abruptly shut down an anticorruption commission he had created
in 2013.
Details of the specific charges to be brought against Mr. Silver were
unclear on Wednesday night, but one of the people with knowledge of the
matter said they stemmed from payments that Mr. Silver received from a
small law firm that specializes in seeking reductions of New York City
real estate taxes. Mr. Silver failed to list the payments from the firm,
Goldberg & Iryami, on his annual financial disclosure filings, as
required.Keep on reading…

If Obama doesn't care want the GOP controlled Congress thinks, why should they defer to him on anything?

January 21, 2015 President Obama
warned Congress Tuesday night that he would veto any new sanctions
legislation on Iran, saying it would derail U.S. negotiations in the
Middle East. But John Boehner isn't ready to sit out the battle over
Iran's nuclear program.

"[Obama's] exact message to us was: 'Hold your fire.' He expects us to stand idly by and do nothing while he cuts a bad deal with Iran. Two words: 'Hell no!'" the House speaker said during his weekly press briefing on Wednesday. "We're going to do no such thing."

Instead,
Boehner has invited Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to
address Congress next month. He didn't consult with the White House
before extending the invitation, and administration officials are not
happy. Press secretary Josh Earnest said Wednesday afternoon that
Boehner's invitation is a breach of normal diplomatic protocol.
Typically, a nation's leader would contact the White House before
planning a visit to the United States, he said. The White House heard
about the invite from Boehner's office, not from the Israelis.

Wednesday, January 21, 2015

Vice President Joe Biden said he thinks the proposals
outlined by President Obama in last night’s State of the Union address
will have traction because Republicans are “taking credit for the
recovery, so they must think something we did went pretty well.”
“Secondly, they’re talking about the middle class. That’s not been
part of their political vocabulary up until now. And so, there’s going
to be some stark choices. You know, they’re going to have to decide
whether or not they’re going to actually step up, help the middle class,
with tax cuts, with education and — on those issues,” Biden told ABC
this morning.
“And I believe there’s a significant core of Republicans who believe
that now is the time to make this recovery good for everyone and
stronger for the middle class.”Keep reading…

Is Mitt Romney becoming a climate change crusader?
During his 2012 presidential bid, Romney was dismissive about
Democratic efforts to combat the effects of climate change, and he
pushed for an expanded commitment to fossil fuels. But in a speech in
California on Monday, Romney, who is considering a third run for
president in 2016, signaled a shift on the issue. According to the Palm
Springs Desert Sun, the former Massachusetts governor “said that while
he hopes the skeptics about global climate change are right, he believes
it’s real and a major problem,” and he lamented that Washington had
done “almost nothing” to stop it.
For Romney, this is his second about-face on climate change. In his
2010 book, No Apology, he called human activity a “contributing factor”
to melting ice caps. And in the run-up to the 2012 Republican primaries,
Romney backed a reduction in emissions to curb anthropogenic global
warming. “I believe based on what I read that the world is getting
warmer,” he told the Manchester Union-Leader in 2011. “And…I believe
that humans contribute to that. I don’t know how much our contribution
is to that, because I know there have been periods of greater heat and
warmth in the past, but I believe that we contribute to that. So I think
it’s important for us to reduce our emissions of pollutants and
greenhouse gases that may well be significant contributors to the
climate change and the global warming that you’re seeing.”

As media outlets focused on the World Economic Forum’s plans to address climate change it ignored the hypocrisy of the huge number of private jets flying world leaders and celebrities to that conference.Roughly 1,700 private planes will head to Davos, Switzerland for the 2015 World Economic Forum. That doesn’t include commercial air travel or any other method of transit to the conference. Ironically, the top article featured on the “Agenda” section of the World Economic Forum website on Jan. 19, boldly stated that “[d]ecarbonising the global economy in a matter of decades is the number one priority.”According to Newsweek, former vice president Al Gore will be speaking at Davos “to stress the importance of tackling climate change.”USA Today hyped the global gathering and specifically mentioned climate change as one of the “global wounds that require bandaging.” There was no mention of the huge carbon expenditures the trip would require or the number of private jets flying to Davos.The Huffington Post noted that “it's a bit ironic to discuss climate change at Davos, a remote location in Switzerland that requires a tremendous carbon footprint to even get to,” but didn’t call out attendees for hypocrisy.

Team Ted Cruz is taking shape, and the Senate first-termer’s presidential campaign could start before this spring.
The Republican senator from Texas tentatively plans to launch in the
first quarter of this year, with senior campaign roles to be filled by
the triumvirate he signed last summer to expand his political operation.
At the top is Jeff Roe, whose organizational title is undefined but who
would be the campaign’s chief strategic and logistics decision-maker.
Jason Miller would shape and oversee campaign messaging; Lauren Lofstrom
would direct fundraising.
Cruz is in the process of “feeling out” additional campaign hires and
prospective donors in preparation to join the field of 2016 candidates.
If the senator decides to run for president, he wants to hit the ground
at full speed, a senior Cruz advisor confirmed Monday.Keep on reading…

Billy Crystal, who played one of the first openly gay
characters on TV in the Seventies, told the Television Critics
Association that gay scenes aren’t “to his taste”.
Speaking during a panel interview in Pasadena, the actor said: “Sometimes I think: ‘Ah that’s too much for me’.
“Sometimes, it’s just pushing it a little too far for my taste and
I’m not going to reveal to you which ones they are. I hope people don’t
abuse it and shove it in our face to the point where it feels like an
every-day kind of thing,” Crystal added.
The actor played Jodie Dallas on Soap, one of the first unambiguously gay characters on US television, from 1977-1981.Keep on reading…

Monday, January 19, 2015

I guess it is easy for those who have never felt the stinging darts of
segregation to say, “Wait.” But when you have seen vicious mobs lynch
your mothers and fathers at will and drown your sisters and brothers at
whim; when you have seen hate filled policemen curse, kick, brutalize
and even kill your black brothers and sisters with impunity; when you
see the vast majority of your twenty million Negro brothers smothering
in an airtight cage of poverty in the midst of an affluent society; when
you suddenly find your tongue twisted and your speech stammering as you
seek to explain to your six-year-old daughter why she can’t go to the
public amusement park that has just been advertised on television, and
see tears welling up in her eyes when she is told that Funtown is closed
to colored children, and see the depressing clouds of inferiority begin
to form in her little mental sky, and see her begin to distort her
little personality by unconsciously developing a bitterness toward white
people; when you have to concoct an answer for a five-year-old son
asking in agonizing pathos: “Daddy, why do white people treat colored
people so mean?”; when you take a cross-country drive and find it
necessary to sleep night after night in the uncomfortable corners of
your automobile because no motel will accept you; when you are
humiliated day in and day out by nagging signs reading “white” and
“colored”; when your first name becomes “nigger,” your middle name
becomes “boy” (however old you are) and your last name becomes “John,”
and your wife and mother are never given the respected title “Mrs.”;
when you are harried by day and haunted by night by the fact that you
are a Negro, living constantly at tip-toe stance never quite knowing
what to expect next, and plagued with inner fears and outer resentments;
when you are forever fighting a degenerating sense of “nobodiness”;
then you will understand why we find it difficult to wait. There comes a
time when the cup of endurance runs over, and men are no longer willing
to be plunged into an abyss of despair. I hope, sirs, you can
understand our legitimate and unavoidable impatience.

The Environmental Protection Agency is set to finalize a set of regulations in February that critics say will effectively ban production of 80 percent of the wood- and pellet-burning stoves in America.
The EPA had published a set of proposed regulations more than a year ago, and since then had accepted public comments.
But the regulations already are having an impact. An advertisement
for the Central Boiler Company says that company’s classic outdoor wood
furnaces will be outlawed by the new regulations and will not be available later this spring.
The EPA has argued that the new regulations would improve air
quality. The regulations require stoves to burn 85 percent cleaner.

A poster with the message “On a mission for both God and Country” on
display outside a recruiting station in Phoenix was removed Friday
morning after it was brought to the attention of the the Army Recruiting Command.
The poster features a Special Forces patch and Ranger, Airborne, and Special Forces tabs with a “stock image” the command
makes available for local recruiters to use, “but the text was changed
by the local recruiting personnel,” and not cleared by command
headquarters, spokesman Brian Lepleytold the Army Times on Friday.
“Had the process been followed, the copy shown would not have been approved,” Mr. Lepley added.

WASHINGTON
– President Barack Obama will call for increasing taxes on the
wealthiest Americans by raising the capital gains rate and eliminating a
tax break on inheritances, then using the revenue to fund new tax
credits and other cost-saving measures for the middle class.
The president’s proposals are likely to be cheered by the Democratic
Party’s liberal base, but the tax increases are all but certain to be
non-starters with the new Republican majority on Capitol Hill.
Obama will announce the tax proposals Tuesday night in his State of
the Union address. Senior administration officials disclosed details
Saturday on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized
to discuss the proposals by name ahead of the president.
The president’s address — his first to a Republican-led Congress —
will also include calls for lawmakers to make community college free for
many students, increase paid leave for workers and enact broad
cybersecurity rules.Keep on reading…

Saturday, January 17, 2015

As French authorities continue their hunt for possible
accomplices of the Islamist extremist gunmen who killed 17 people over
three days in Paris last week, it has emerged two of the attackers were
found in possession of paedo-pornographic material during an earlier
anti-terrorism investigation.
In 2010, a police search of the computers of Cherif Kouachi and Amedy
Coulibaly revealed traces of child porn images the two men had stored
and later erased, French media reported.
The two were under investigation for their alleged role in the
botched attempt to free from prison Smain Ait Ali Belkacem, a jihadi
serving a life sentence for a 1995 metro station bombing in Paris.Detectives found five child porn photos on Coulibaly’s laptop and another 37 on Kouachi’s PC.
Kouachi’s stash included sickening pictures of young boys and girls
involved in sexual acts with adults, Le Canard Enchaîné newspaper
reported.
The findings were deemed as unrelated to the anti-terrorism probe and thus not investigated further.

Fox gets three (two on Fox News, one on Fox Business), CNN gets two,
and CBS, NBC, ABC, and CNBC get one apiece. MSNBC gets some magic beans.
Of note: The NBC debate will be co-sponsored by Telemundo and will be
held in Florida in February 2016, shortly before the primary. If Jeb
Bush is still in the race by then, that’s his time to shine. Lotttt of
pressure on McConnell and Boehner, meanwhile, to do something on
immigration reform by then so that the remaining GOP candidates have
something to tout to Latino voters tuning in.
If this seems like conspicuously fewer debates than we’re used to
after the last two presidential cycles, that’s because it is. And
there’s a reason for it.

Friday, January 16, 2015

(Times of Israel)- The US Consulate in Jerusalem is training a force of 35 Palestinians
from East Jerusalem to serve as armed guards, particularly for consular
trips to the West Bank’s Area A, which is off-limits to Israelis, it was
reported on Wednesday.

The arrangement violates a 2011 agreement
between Israel and the consulate, the Hebrew daily Yedioth Ahronoth
stated, whereby only IDF combat veterans would be authorized to carry
arms as consulate guards.

“The consulate was authorized to keep roughly
100 handguns for security staff, on condition that they be either
American diplomats or Israeli army veterans,” the paper’s Itamar Eichner
wrote.

Additionally, Israeli guards at the consulate
alleged that the Palestinians were being trained with firearms in
Jericho at a Palestinian Preventative Security base and in the United
States.

Do you remember when gay meant happy? I do. SCOTUS is going to rule if there is a constitutional right to gay marriage. There isn't, but I believe it is a states issue. If they want to allow it, I am OK with that. If you believe the constitution guarantees a right to gay marriage, you have to believe the people who wrote the Constitution supported gay marriage or they accidentally wrote in the right due to stupidity. Neither of those scenarios are true. This is the same as abortion. SCOTUS found the right, but it is not based on the Constitution. If you read the Roe vs. Wade decision, the word Constitution only comes up once.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Setting the stage for a potentially historic ruling, the Supreme
Court announced Friday it will decide whether same-sex couples have a
right to marry everywhere in America under the Constitution.

The
justices will take up gay-rights cases that ask them to overturn bans
in four states and declare for the entire nation that people can marry
the partners of their choice, regardless of gender. The cases will be
argued in April, and a decision is expected by late June.

Proponents
of same-sex marriage said they expect the court to settle the matter
once and for all with a decision that invalidates state provisions that
define marriage as between a man and a woman.

After three years of watching his fellow leaders mix and
mingle while he was secluded in Pyongyang, Kim Jong Un is looking more
and more likely to visit Russia in his first trip abroad since taking
power in the world’s first look at the young North Korean leader at work
on the international stage.
Moscow has invited many world leaders — including Kim and the
presidents of China and South Korea — to celebrations marking the 70th
anniversary of the Soviet Union’s victory over Nazi Germany, which will
include a massive parade on Red Square.
Russian President Vladimir Putin’s foreign affairs adviser, Yuri
Ushakov, said last month the Kremlin had received the “first signals
from Pyongyang” the North Korean leader is planning to attend the May 9
festivities. South Korean media quoting anonymous sources in Beijing
reported this week that Kim is likely to accept. U.S. President Barack
Obama has reportedly decided to stay home, so that awkwardness has
apparently been averted.[…]

January 15, 2015 HERSHEY, Pa.—After
hearing a week's worth of complaints from his conservative members,
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said Thursday that the Senate
will attempt to approve a House-passed bill that guts President Obama's
executive actions on immigration.
Months
after the president announced his executive action to protect millions
of illegal immigrants within U.S. borders, Senate Republican leaders
have been cagey about how they will respond, raising concerns among
border hawks within the conference. But McConnell affirmed at a joint
House and Senate Republican retreat in Hershey, Pa., that he will work
to get the House's bill—which passed that chamber Wednesday—to the
president's desk. "We're going to try to pass it," he told reporters
Thursday.
The
House bill appears very unlikely to pass the Senate, where McConnell
will need to attract at least six Democrats to reach the 60-vote
threshold to end debate. Although conservatives have called on McConnell
to bring the bill to the floor immediately, he did not offer a timeline
for consideration on Thursday. Funding for the Department of Homeland
Security expires at the end of February.
McConnell
did not provide a path forward Thursday in the likely case that the
House bill fails. Passing the House bill would "be our first choice,"
McConnell said. "If we're not able to do that, then we'll let you know
what's next." Keep on reading...

On Boxing Day last month, the New York Times published a
story about an Islamic State (Isis) defector: a 14-year-old Syrian boy
named Usaid Barho. According to Tim Arango, the journalist who wrote the
story, Barho had been recruited by Isis via a mosque in his hometown,
Manbij, near Aleppo. But within months of joining he began to have
serious doubts about his decision and wanted to escape, volunteering to
undertake a suicide attack so that he could sabotage the mission and
surrender himself to security forces.
The plan worked and the target of Barho’s mission – a Shiite mosque
in Baghdad – wasn’t incinerated and bespattered with human body parts.
It was saved, as were the people praying inside it.
Barho’s story, as Arango makes clear, is part of a bigger story about
the systematic exploitation and abuse of children in the conflicts in
Syria and Iraq.
Arango observes that young boys have been recruited into Isis and
sent to Iraq to fight or have been lined up, as Barho was, to become
suicide bombers; that thousands have been killed or injured in bombings,
crossfire and even executions; and that many young girls from minority
groups have been kidnapped and sold into sexual slavery.
One detail in Arango’s story, however, stands out: it is the
reference to homosexual sex in an Isis training camp. “He [Barho] said
he saw men having sex with other men behind the tents in the desert
night.”

New emails obtained by Judicial Watch through a Freedom
of Information Act Lawsuit show former IRS official Lois Lerner begged
her supervisor not to visit the Cincinnati office or ask specific
questions related to Congressional inquiries into whether the agency was
improperly targeting conservative groups just ahead of the 2012
presidential election. As a reminder, it wasn’t until May 2013 when
Lerner admitted inappropriate targeting had occurred and plead the Fifth
in front of the House Oversight Committee.
“Please don’t ask them about closures, pipelines, wait time for full
development cases, or the c4 application letter … can we put this off
please?” Lerner sent on April 4, 2012 to her then supervisor Tax Exempt
and Government Entities Division Deputy Director Joseph H. Grant shortly
after he announced a planned visit to the Cincinnati office.Keep on reading…

Wednesday, January 14, 2015

Gasoline prices are plummeting and natural gas prices are
relatively low, but electricity prices are still climbing. Not only
that, residential electricity prices are expected to hit record levels
in 2015 and 2016, according to federal government projections.
U.S. average electricity rates will hit a record high, this year, at
38 percent higher than they were in 2001, according to the Energy
Information Administration. That record is expected to be beaten in
2016, as prices hit 12.86 cents per kilowatthour (kWh)– the highest
annual average price in the 21st century.
Electricity prices have been creeping up since 2001, according EIA
data, and prices are set to rise even further as coal-fired power plants
are shut down due to Environmental Protection Agency clean air
regulations. So far, 381 coal-fired generators are slated to shutdown
over the coming years due to EPA rules.Keep on reading…

DURHAM, N.C. — A weekly call to prayer for Muslims will be heard at Duke University starting Friday, school officials said.
Members of the Duke Muslim Students Association will chant the call,
known as adhan or azan, from the Duke Chapel bell tower each Friday at 1
p.m. The call to prayer will last about three minutes and be
“moderately amplified,” officials said in a statement Tuesday.
“The adhan is the call to prayer that brings Muslims back to their
purpose in life, which is to worship God, and serves as a reminder to
serve our brothers and sisters in humanity,” said Imam Adeel Zeb, Muslim
chaplain at Duke. “The collective Muslim community is truly grateful
and excited about Duke’s intentionality toward religious and cultural
diversity.”
In majority Muslim countries across the globe, the adhan is broadcast
from mosques and on television and radio stations five times a day to
correspond with prayer times. On Fridays, the day of worship in Islam,
sermons are also broadcast.

Such a statement has been made by Andrey Illarionov, a former Vladimir Putin’s
advisor. In an interview to a Polish portal “Plus Minus”, he evaluates
and explains the policy of Russia, wPolityce news source writes.
“It is inevitable that the Russian intervention will take place. The
only question is, when exactly. Russia had never concealed that, as it
had started to destabilize the situation in Georgia, Kazakhstan,
Azerbaijan, as well as in Latvia and Bulgaria, long ago. I believe that
in the next two years a culminating point of these actions is going to
happen. Let us remember that exactly the same time is left until the end
of Obama’s term. Vladimir Putin realizes that this politician is the most ineffective US president in entire history. He knows that he should use the weakness of Barack Obama before the next presidential election in the US as soon as possible,” the expert said.
Andrey Illarionov is convinced that if a more serious and powerful
politician were in the White House, it would not be so easy for Vladimir
Putin to pursue his aggressive policy.

CNN’s Chris Cuomo openly promised Tuesday that CNN will
help the White House in a “shame campaign” to get Congress to act on
education. During an interview with Obama’s Secretary of Education, Arne
Duncan, Cuomo also promised to use the show he co-hosts, “New Day,” in
this shaming campaign.
“Secretary, my only advice for you is that you should go on a shame
campaign with congress to get them to act,” Cuomo said. “New Day will
help. CNN will help.” (full transcript of the exchange below).
The exchange in question centered on the White House proposal to use
the federal government to force taxpayers to pay for two years of “free”
community college. It would be unfair, though, to assume that Cuomo’s
pledge centered on Obama’s push for free community college. Cuomo
appears to be referring in general to Congress acting on education.
Cuomo frequently urges federal officials from both parties to get things
done.Keep on reading…

(WaTi)
– The White House tried to explain Tuesday why it has refused to use
the term “radical Islam” in describing the Islamist terrorists
responsible for last week’s Paris attacks and other acts of violence
across the globe.
White House press secretary Josh Earnest said the administration
doesn’t want to legitimize those terrorists or the “warped” view of
Islam they hold. Also, Mr. Earnest said, the phrase “radical Islam”
simply is not an accurate way to describe the enemies of the U.S.,
France and other nations across the globe.
“I certainly wouldn’t want to be in a position where I’m repeating
the justification they have cited that I think is illegitimate. They had
invoked Islam to justify their attacks,” he told reporters. “I think
what I’m trying to do is to describe to you what happened and what they
did. These individuals are terrorists. … We have chosen not to use that
label [of radical Islam] because it doesn’t seem to accurately describe
what happened.”